Wilbur Scoville ganhou um Doodle do Google com direito a um jogo que simula o ‘teste da escala quente’ de pimentas. Hoje, o Google celebra o nascimento do químico há 151 anos (1865-1942). Scoville, além de receber a homenagem desta sexta-feira (22), é conhecido por ter inventado um método de avaliação do nível de ardência de vários tipos de pimenta, a famosa Escala de Scoville, disponível abaixo em app.
O Doodle foi produzido pela artista e doodler do Google Olivia Huynh. Para a designer, a melhor parte do trabalho foi desenhar as pimentas e as reações de Scoville. “O conceito de picante é universal, cômico, e foi o que tentei usar para criar esse jogo de luta”, explica Huynh, em post do Google.
“Fiz storyboards de como poderia ser, rascunhos e testamos um protótipo. Depois vieram os cenários e animações. Desenhar as pimentas e as reações de Scoville foram minhas partes favoritas”, conta.
Doodle também é informativo, detalhando tipos de pimentas (Foto: Reprodução/Google)
Escala de Scoville
Wilbur Lincoln Scoville nasceu em Bridgeport, nos Estados Unidos, em 22 de janeiro de 1865 e morreu em 10 de março de 1942. O trabalho do americano como farmacêutico é reconhecido mundialmente: criou o Teste Organoléptico de Scoville, que gerou a já conhecida Escala de Scoville.
Com este método, Wilbur Lincoln Scoville definiu o grau de pungência de vários tipos de pimenta, através da detecção da concentração de capsaicina, substância responsável pela ardência da pimenta.
O teste é um Procedimento de Diluição e Prova. Scoville misturava as pimentas puras com uma solução de água com açúcar, e quanto mais solução fosse necessária para diluir a pimenta, mais alta seria sua picância. Depois disso, o método foi melhorado e foram criadas as unidades de calor Scoville (Scoville Heat Units, ou SHU).
Doodle Wilbur Scoville (Foto: Reprodução/Google)
Uma xícara de pimenta que equivale a 1.000 xícaras de água é uma unidade na escala de Scoville. A substância Capsaicina, que gera a ardência nas pimentas, equivale a 15 milhões de unidades Scoville.
A pimenta mexicana Habanero chega a 300 mil, uma “Red Savina Habanero”, modificada, tem 577 mil, e a Tezpur indiana, 877 mil.
Entretanto, este não foi o único trabalho de Scoville. “The Art of Compounding” (A Arte dos Compostos), de 1895, é um de seus livros, que foi usado como referência na farmacologia até os anos 60.
Scoville também publicou um livro com centenas de fórmulas de perfumes e outras essências, que foi chamado de “Extract and Perfumes” (Extratos e perfumes).
Em 1922, Scoville recebeu o Prêmio Ebert, e em 1929 ganhou a sua Medalha de Honra Remington e o título de Doutor honoris causa em Ciências pela Universidade de Columbia. O pesquisador morreu no dia 10 de março de 1942, deixando mulher e dois filhos.
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Desde que saltara la noticia de la ruptura entre Lara Dibildos y Joaquín Capel nunca se les había vuelto a ver juntos. El pasado martes ambos acudieron por separado a la fiesta de despedida de solteros que Julián Porras y Olivia de Borbón celebraron en la discoteca Gabana. Joaquín llegó solo para brindar con el futuro matrimonio. Dentro de la sala coincidió con Fran Murcia, exmarido de Lara y padre de su hijo, con el que se saludó amistosamente. Minutos después llegaba a la discoteca Lara Dibildos, vestida con un impresionante vestido rojo. Nada más bajar las escaleras que dan acceso a la sala, la hija de Laura Valenzuela se topó con Murcia, al que no saludó ni cruzó palabra en ningún momento. Para Lara era una noche especial, no sólo por ser su cumpleaños, sino porque era la primera vez que coincidía públicamente con el que había sido su pareja.
A pesar de tener una mesa reservada a su nombre para ver la actuación de Juan Peña, Joaquín Capel no dudó en sentarse en la misma en la que estaban Lara y algunos amigos que tienen en común. La expareja no sólo se saludaron, sino que estuvieron hablando distendidamente. Uno de los momentos más emotivos fue cuando el cantante jerezano invitó a subir al escenario a Lara Dibildos para cantarle el cumpleaños feliz bajo la atenta mirada de su expareja.
Desde que el empresario abandonara la casa de la actriz hace unas semanas tras hacerse público que ambos habían roto por su incompatibilidad de caracteres en la convivencia, parece que poco a poco se está produciendo un acercamiento entre ellos. Al parecer no sólo han coincidido en varios lugares de ocio junto con otros amigos, sino que Joaquín Capel no deja de enviar mensajes a Lara para volver a conquistarla. Mensajes que, según el entorno de la actriz, no tienen respuesta en muchas ocasiones. Sin embargo, aseguran que, a pesar de que Lara se muestra firme y decidida en su decisión, no sería extraño que les volvamos a ver juntos nuevamente.
Larry Mitchell Hopkins appears in a police booking photo taken in Las Cruces, N.M., on April 20. Hopkins made his initial court appearance Monday, on charges of possession of firearms by a felon.
Dona Ana County Detention Center/Reuters
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Dona Ana County Detention Center/Reuters
Larry Mitchell Hopkins appears in a police booking photo taken in Las Cruces, N.M., on April 20. Hopkins made his initial court appearance Monday, on charges of possession of firearms by a felon.
Dona Ana County Detention Center/Reuters
The alleged leader of an armed militia group that has intercepted and detained migrant families along the southern border in New Mexico was charged with federal firearms offenses on Monday.
Larry Mitchell Hopkins, 69, of Flora Vista, N.M., appeared in federal court in Las Cruces after his arrest on Saturday on charges of illegally possessing firearms as a felon.
A criminal complaint filed by the FBI states that Hopkins, also known as Johnny Horton Jr., was in possession of nine firearms and ammunition in his northern New Mexico home in Nov. 2017. He had three prior felony convictions dating back to 1996, including impersonating a peace officer in the state of Oregon in 2006, according to a press release issued by the U.S. Attorney’s office.
Hopkins’ arrest is not tied to his involvement with the border militia.
Reporter Mallory Falk of NPR member station KRWG toldAll Things Considered that Hopkins leads a group called United Constitutional Patriots:
“It’s a group of armed civilians often dressed in military fatigues. They’ve been camped out in Sunland Park, N.M., which is a small community very close to the U.S.-Mexico border. And they’ve been stopping migrant families that they’re encountering crossing the border who are trying to come into the U.S. to claim asylum. They’ve been stopping those families, telling them to sit on the ground, and then calling Border Patrol, and Border Patrol then comes in and apprehends those families.”
Hopkins’ attorney, Kelly O’Connell, told Falk that the militia group believes it is aiding an overstretched Border Patrol.
“They generally think that Border Patrol is spread too thin and that there are gaps in the system or there’s literal gaps in the fence,” said O’Connell. “They think they believe that they are helping to enforce the law of America.”
A spokesman for Customs and Border Protection, in an emailed statement, said “U.S. Customs and Border Protection does not endorse or condone private groups or organizations taking enforcement matters into their own hands. Interference by civilians in law enforcement matters could have public safety and legal consequences for all parties involved.”
Falk reported that federal officials are not commenting on the timing of the charges against Hopkins for offenses committed in Nov. 2017. But she said that his attorney suggested that state officials want to stop the group’s border activities and are using charges that are a year-and-a-half old to put pressure on them.
The FBI began investigating Hopkins after receiving reports that the United Constitutional Patriots were targeting Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton and George Soros for assassination.
Hopkins is no stranger to investigators who track right-wing activities. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Hopkins, using his pseudonym Horton, claims to have advised President Trump on border security.
Hopkins is expected to enter a plea of not guilty at a bond hearing next week in Albuquerque.
Hopkins faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in imprison if convicted.
A jury convicted two American friends Wednesday in the 2019 slaying of a police officer in a tragic unraveling of a small time drug deal gone bad, sentencing them to the maximum life in prison.
The jury of two judges and six civilians deliberated more than 12 hours before delivering the verdicts against Finnegan Lee Elder, 21, and Gabriel Natale-Hjorth, 20, handing them Italy’s stiffest sentence.
Elder and Natale-Hjorth were found guilty of all charges: homicide, attempted extortion, assault, resisting a public official and carrying an attack-style knife without just cause. There was a gasp in the Rome courtroom as the presiding judge, Marina Finiti, read the verdict.
Prosecutors alleged that Elder stabbed Vice Brigadier Mario Cerciello Rega 11 times with a knife that he brought with him on his trip to Europe from California and that Natale-Hjorth helped him hide the knife in their hotel room. Under Italian law, an accomplice in an alleged murder can also be charged with murder even without materially doing the slaying.
The July 26, 2019 killing of the officer in the storied Carabinieri paramilitary police corps shocked Italy. Cerciello Rega, 35, was mourned as a national hero.
The slain officer’s widow, who held a photo of her dead husband while waiting for the verdict, broke down in tears and hugged his brother, Paolo.
“His integrity was defended,” Rosa Maria Esilio said outside the courtroom, between sobs. “He was everyone’s son, everyone’s Carabinieri. He was a marvelous husband, he was a marvelous man, a servant of the state who merited respect and honor.”
The defendants were led immediately out of the courtroom after the verdicts were read. As Elder was being walked out, his father, Ethan Elder, called out, “Finnegan, I love you.” Both of his parents looked stunned.
Elder’s lawyer, Renato Borzone, called the verdict against his client “a disgrace for Italy.” Natale-Hjorth’s lawyer, Fabio Alonzi, said he was speechless.
For the brief final hearing before deliberations Wednesday, the two Californians were allowed out of steel-barred defendant cages inside the courtroom to sit with their lawyers before the case went to the jury.
“I’m stressed,” Elder said to one of his lawyers. Elder fingered a crucifix he wears on a chain around his neck and kissed it before the jury went out. He also turned to his codefendant, Natale-Hjorth, and held the crucifix toward him through a glass partition, motioning heavenward.
Elder and his father crossed their fingers toward each other for good luck after the jury went into chambers.
Natale-Hjorth was greeted by his father and Italian uncle, who were present for the deliberations.
Finnegan Lee Elder listens as the verdict is read, in the trial for the slaying of an Italian plainclothes police officer in summer 2019, in Rome, Wednesday, May 5, 2021.
Gregorio Borgia / AP
Cerciello Rega had recently returned from a honeymoon when he was assigned along with his partner, officer Andrea Varriale, to follow up on a reported extortion attempt. They went in plainclothes, and didn’t carry their service pistols.
Prosecutors contend the young Americans concocted a plot involving a stolen bag and cellphone after their failed attempt to buy cocaine with 80 euros ($96) in Rome’s Trastevere nightlife district. Natale-Hjorth and Elder testified they had paid for the cocaine but didn’t receive it.
Both defendants contended they acted in self-defense.
During the trial, which began on February 26, 2020, the Americans told the court they thought that Cerciello Rega and Varriale were thugs or mobsters out to assault them on a dark, deserted street. The officers wore casual summer clothes and not uniforms, and the defendants insisted the officers never showed police badges.
Varriale, who suffered a back injury in a scuffle with Natale-Hjorth while his partner was grappling with Elder, testified that the officers did identify themselves as Carabinieri.
At the time of the slaying, Elder was 19 and traveling through Europe without his family, while Natale-Hjorth, then 18, was spending the summer vacation with his Italian grandparents, who live near Rome. Former schoolmates from the San Francisco Bay area, the two had met up in Rome for what was supposed to be couple of days of sightseeing and nights out.
Prosecutors alleged that Elder thrust a seven-inch military-style attack knife repeatedly into Cerciello Rega, who bled profusely, like a “fountain,” Varriale had testified, and died shortly after in hospital.
Elder told the court that the heavy-set Cerciello Rega, scuffling with him, was on top of him on the ground, and he feared that he was being strangled. Elder said he pulled out the knife and stabbed him to avoid being killed, and when the officer didn’t immediately let him go, he stabbed again.
After the stabbing, the Americans ran to their hotel room, where, according to Natale-Hjorth, Elder cleaned the knife and then asked him to hide it. Natale-Hjorth testified that he hid the knife behind a ceiling panel in their room, where it was discovered hours later by police.
The defendants had told the court that several hours before the stabbing, they attempted to buy cocaine in the Trastevere nightlife district of Rome. With the intervention of a go-between, they paid a dealer, but instead of cocaine they received an aspirin-like tablet.
Before Natale-Hjorth could confront the dealer, a separate Carabinieri patrol in the neighborhood intervened, and all scattered. The Americans snatched the go-between’s knapsack in reprisal, and used a cellphone that was inside to set up a meeting with the goal of exchanging the bag and the phone for the cash they had lost in the bad drug deal.
From practically its start, the trial largely boiled down to the word of Varriale against that of the young American visitors. The victim’s widow would sit in the front row, often clutching a photo of her husband. Photos of the newlyweds, with Cerciello Rega in his dress uniform, after their wedding, were widely displayed in Italian media after the slaying.
As the trial neared its end, Elder’s lawyer, Borzone, argued that deep-set psychiatric problems, including a constant fear of being attacked, figured in the fatal stabbing. Borzone told the court his client saw a world filled with enemies due to psychiatric problems and that something “short-circuited” when Elder was confronted by the officer.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s long-awaited report may not be as shocking as it has been built up to be – at least according to ABC News White House correspondent Jonathan Karl.
Speaking to host George Stephanopoulos Sunday on “This Week,” Karl said that he’s been told by sources close to the investigation that the report into Russian interference in the 2016 election and any possible collusion between President Trump’s campaign and Moscow is “almost certain to be anti-climactic.”
“There have been expectations that have been building, of course, for over a year,” Karl told Stephanopoulos. “But people who are closest to what Mueller has been doing, interacting with the special counsel, caution me that this report is almost certain to be anti-climactic.”
“If you look at what the FBI was investigating in that New York Times report, you look at what they were investigating, Mueller did not go anywhere with that investigation,” Karl continued. “He has been writing his report in real time through these indictments and we have seen nothing from Mueller on the central question of, was there any coordination, collusion, with the Russians in the effort to meddle in the elections? Or was there even any knowledge on the part of the president or anybody in his campaign with what the Russians were doing, there’s been no indication of that.”
Karl’s comments come two days after the New York Times reported that the FBI opened an investigation into whether Trump was working on behalf of Russia in 2017 following the president’s dismissal of former FBI director James Comey.
Trump called Fox News’ Jeanine Pirro and told her that the newspaper’s report was “insulting.”
“I think it’s the most insulting thing I’ve ever been asked,” Trump told her when asked if he had ever worked on behalf of Russia. “I think it’s the most insulting article I’ve ever had written.”
Embattled celebrity lawyer Michael Avenatti has been accused of embezzling almost $2 million after he struck a lucrative settlement for the former girlfriend of NBA player Hassan Whiteside.
Avenatti, as the attorney for Alexis Gardner, 27, negotiated a $3 million deal for the actress and barista, $2.75 million of which Miami Heat player Whiteside, 29, wired to a trust account set up by Avenatti in January 2017, according to bank records and an Apr. 10 indictment by a California-based grand jury.
Avenatti was entitled to $1 million in legal fees, but he did not tell Gardner about the payment and misrepresented the terms of her agreement with Whiteside, prosecutors allege in the indictment. Instead, he funneled $2.5 million into the bank account of a law firm owned by an associate so he could buy a share of a small private jet.
Avenatti told Gardner that Whiteside’s first payment was for legal fees, but that she would be receive monthly installments over the next eight years. He made 11 transfers to Gardner, totaling $194,000, before the money ceased in June 2018.
Although Whiteside and Gardner confirmed the settlement in a statement, Avenatti pushed back on accusations he acted illegally or inappropriately.
“No monies were ever embezzled from anyone and I look forward to all of the relevant documents and facts being presented at trial,” he told the Los Angeles Times in an email. “The clients complaining are a very small fraction of the thousands of clients I have serviced over my nearly 20 year career.”
The 36-count grand jury indictment refers to four other clients from which Avenatti allegedly stole millions of dollars, including mentally ill, paraplegic Geoffrey Ernest Johnson and YouTube makeup artist Michelle Phan. He has also been charged tax, bank, and bankruptcy fraud, as well as perjury. He additionally faces a federal extortion and conspiracy case in New York over his dealings with Nike. Avenatti denies any wrongdoing.
